Apple.

My first trip up to Elijay to experience its annual apple festival of goodness. 

Complete and made joyful with an apple cider slushie, apple tastings, the best caramel apple ever, flat homemade root beer and cream soda in awesome blue bottles, and a hot air balloon ride. Yes, a ride in a hot air balloon! [even if it was tethered to a few cars] 

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My favorite moments included:

* Learning "Pink Ladies" apples are wonderful and "Arkansas Black" apples are grossgrossgross. 

* Seeing the passion and pushy-ness of old ladies to buy their plethora of apples despite the abundance available. 

* This conversation at the homemade root beer stand:

Adam: So, do you guys do this other times of the year?

Young lady selling the soda, wearing a rebel flag hat: Yes, we also do Civil War reenactments.

Adam, without missing a beat: Who do you pull for?

* Playing the cow game and passing graveyards where they all die. It was a big deal. 

* Experiencing "the south" again. Living in metro ATL I often forget it's ohso close. 

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A beautiful weekend. Everything [plus the unexpected] that I could have imagined the Apple Festival to be. 

Only fail of the trip: I forgot to bring my camera.